


Love & Pencil Lines

by kay_emm_gee



Series: Bellarke Fic Week: February 2015 [4]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Fluff, Soldier Bellamy, first 'i love you'
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-17
Updated: 2015-02-17
Packaged: 2018-03-13 12:34:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3381683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kay_emm_gee/pseuds/kay_emm_gee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Day 4: First 'I Love You' </p><p>As Bellamy deploys for an army tour overseas, Clarke slips him a gift that contains a very special message.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love & Pencil Lines

“Clarke, I have to go.”

Bellamy said the words as evenly and neutrally as possible, trying not to make this farewell harder that it already was.  Without missing a beat, Clarke nodded rapidly, a bright, brittle smile on her tense face.

“Okay,” she murmured, reaching up a tentative hand to grip the fabric of his fatigues. “Okay. One more hug and kiss, though.”

Throat closing up, Bellamy yanked her in close, one arm wrapped around her lower back, the other hand cupping her head. Under his touch, he felt her shudder as she sucked in a few unsteady breaths, as if she was crying. When he pulled back though—slowly, very slowly, because he did not want to leave her—her face was dry. She quickly wiped away her unshed tears, clearly not wanting him to see. _Brave princess_ , the thought fondly.

It’s what he had called her on their first date, when she had been adventurous enough to try some of the weirdest sushi on the menu at his favorite hole-in-the-wall place down in Chinatown. Clarke had looked like a princess that night, in her pink sundress and braided crown. Soon, though, he learned of the steel beneath the frills and admired her for it all the more. And here they were, four months later, standing on the tarmac of his army post, saying a last goodbye before he deployed overseas.

Cupping her face with both hands, Bellamy gave her a kiss: short, intense, desperate, and full of things he hadn’t said yet. He felt her lips curve into a smile underneath his, and he almost laughed, because of course she would know what it had meant. She was a smart girl, his princess.

As he pulled away and hefted his duffle onto his shoulder, she kept smiling. Reaching into her coat pocket, she pulled out an envelope.

“I made something for you,” she said, handing it to him. “Don’t open it until you get there.”

Bellamy almost leaned in for another kiss because of the mischief lurking in her eyes, but there was too much sadness there too. If he got that close to her again, he’d be in serious trouble of not actually getting on the bus with the rest of his troop.

“Go,” she whispered, giving him a slight push, as if she could see his hesitation. “Stay safe. I’ll miss you, but I’ll be standing right here when you get back.”

With a nod, because his throat was too thick to manage even a single word, Bellamy spun around and strode off towards the bus and his buddies. He took the last few yards at a jog, trying to let his momentum keep him from turning back. His self-control stayed strong as he loaded his duffle underneath, climbed the steps, and sat down in his seat next to Miller. When bus doors shut, though, he couldn’t resist one last look at Clarke.

There she was, standing and waving, hair glowing in the glaring sun, still smiling that bright, brittle smile as she called out goodbye. He watched her until the bus rumbled to life beneath him and pulled away. Then Bellamy closed his eyes, flashes of sunlit gold sparking across his vision, an image he knew would stay with him the entire time that he was away.

As the chatter on the bus began to rise, Bellamy kept his eyes closed, tapping her envelope against his thigh in a slow rhythm. Running his finger along the sharp edge, he tried to resist the urge to open it. He wanted to follow to her instructions, but he was already missing her—her sound, her smell, her touch—and well, screw it. She would never know.

Carefully, he tore open the near-to-bursting envelope and slid out the stack of papers inside. He unfolded them slowly, grinning when he saw the top sheet. It was a neatly executed pencil drawing of Clarke, a simple self-portrait. Her hair was swept up in a side-bun, a few loose tendrils spiraling around her smiling face, curling down to her exposed shoulders. Bellamy flipped to the next one and chuckled quietly. Clarke had drawn herself as an old-school pin-up girl, something straight out of a 1940’s magazine: blonde hair curled up intricately, with barely-there clothing, a flirtatious smile on her winking face and a conversation bubble above her head that read: “Hey there, Soldier!” It was cute and sexy at the same time, the bright, bold, cheerful colors practically jumping off the page.

When he flipped to the third and last one, his chest seized up and a burning sensation started low in his belly. She must’ve copied it from a picture, because it was a rough charcoal sketch of her, lying on the bed facing away from the viewer, entire back exposed except for the sheet covering her lower half. Bellamy traced the drawn lines on her back, swallowing thickly as he recalled the feel of her real skin beneath his fingers. Even though the noise in the bus was nearly deafening at this point—and someone was bound to notice his distraction sooner or later, which would result in some serious ribbing from his buddies—he couldn’t take his eyes off of the drawing. Now he knew why she had wanted him to open her gift in private.

At that thought, Bellamy quickly folded the drawings back up, cautiously sliding them back into the envelope, which he tucked into his pants pocket for safekeeping. After a few steadying breaths—because his girl was that good of an artist that he was much too affected, physically and emotionally, by her sketches—he finally tuned into the conversation Miller was having with Lincoln, John, and Murphy. Throwing out a laugh and a comment here and there, Bellamy slowly but surely pulled himself back into the present, though his gift and its creator never quite entirely left his thoughts.

It wasn’t until days later, after his troop had finally settled into their living quarters and gotten their maneuver assignments, that Bellamy noticed the delicate, loopy, familiar writing scribbled in the corners of the drawings. One word for each piece, adding up to a three-letter sentence that made Bellamy feel as if his heart was going to beat straight out of his chest. It was torture waiting until he could call home, and then, when he finally saw her face—in all of its poorly pixelated glory—the first words out of his smiling mouth were: “I love you, too, Clarke.”  

**Author's Note:**

> One of my best friends is engaged to an army guy, and when I asked her for help on this prompt, this is what morphed out of her suggestions. Thanks to her fiancé for answering all of my questions about army deployment/visitor procedure.


End file.
